


Your Hand in Mine, Forever

by hops



Category: The Adventure Zone (Podcast)
Genre: F/M, Post-Canon, fluff maybe? idk, spoilers for the stolen century onward, this is me waxing poetic abt lup leave me alone, this reads like a flowery description of an indie movie scene and i dont care
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-31
Updated: 2017-08-31
Packaged: 2018-12-22 00:39:05
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 969
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11956068
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hops/pseuds/hops
Summary: "Her presence overwhelms him. She’s the sun and he’s a shooting star, a wink in the span of her entire universe. He is overcome with the feeling of her, there, on top of him. She smiles against his mouth and pulls him by the shoulder to roll them over so she’s lying below him and he’s holding his breath so he doesn’t cry. The image of her below him in the grass is like a dream; a memory of her among wildflowers and billowing waves of grass that’d left him and then returned, over and over again."Barry and Lup visit a familiar hillside, just one more time.





	Your Hand in Mine, Forever

**Author's Note:**

> (the hillside is the one in faerun not the one at the conservatory. anyway.) 
> 
> kind of a sequel to [this thing](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11789454)
> 
> yes, this is my fourth iron & wine lyric for a title, don't @ me

They’re laying on the grassy hill above the site of the last glassing before Lup’s disappearance. A crude crown of wildflowers weaves in and out of her curls and tucks behind her ears. The sky is pink and orange and beautiful, and she kisses him.    
It’s light, like falling rain, like waking to the dawn through an open window. She kisses him and it’’s so  _ right,  _ he’s struggling to find words. So he says nothing, only pulls her on top of him and kisses her until she pulls away with a fond smile and a hand on the side of his face.

The sunset makes a halo in her wild blonde hair. The glow is only interrupted by the shadows cast by her upturned ears and the glimmer of her golden earrings. And they kiss and kiss and he can’t get enough of her, just one more, that’ll be enough. 

She’s  _ there  _ and he’s holding her and his hand is on the small of her back and it’s just like it used to be and she’s there she’s  _ there she’s there  _ after spending so, so long apart. 

He feels relief. And to think that at times, he’d thought she really was gone. That he’d be cursed to the pact that they’d made for an eternity together, now completely alone. He sighs into her mouth, half in the shock of the touch of her mouth, half in relief that he’s touching her at all. He holds tighter still, just a little tighter, that’ll be enough to keep her from slipping between his fingers in a cloud of reddish smoke; the fixation of his very worst nightmares. 

He dreamt about her the first night in each new body. The static woke him up screaming. 

He kisses her again, again, holds her tighter. He can’t get close enough. She’s  _ warm  _ against him. Her new body is just as she left it-- soft, sweet-smelling, flushed pink. And he loves her. He loves her just as the day she left him.  _ Back soon.  _ Every time he’d looked at the note, he missed her, memories intact or not. He’d said goodbye to that loneliness for good the day he dropped the note into that brackish green tank. He prays he never has to feel the acidic ache of her absence drill through him again. 

Her presence overwhelms him. She’s the sun and he’s a shooting star, a wink in the span of her entire universe. He is overcome with the feeling of her,  _ there _ , on top of him. She smiles against his mouth and pulls him by the shoulder to roll them over so she’s lying below him and he’s holding his breath so he doesn’t cry. The image of her below him in the grass is like a dream; a memory of her among wildflowers and billowing waves of grass that’d left him and then returned, over and over again. A prodigal love. 

He touches her cheek tenderly. He feels like he’s gazing at the sun; that if he stares for too long, he’ll be blinded with just the essence of her. 

_ “I love you,”  _ he says softly. And again, again, again, showering her in kisses:  _ “I love you. I love you, oh, Lup.”  _

And her grin against his lips. And her hand buried in his hair. 

He rolls onto his side next to her and gets close, pressing their noses together. She scrunches her face. His bottom lip trembles as he smiles. 

Concern touches her face as she spots the tiny tears behind his glasses. His blue eyes had been cursed to always give him away. “ _ Barold?”  _

And he laughs. He should know better by now then to think she’d ever be serious for more than a moment. So instead, he says,  _ “You’re here,”  _ in wonder, and smiles through tears. 

The sun is half-set, the sky glowing pink and purple that touch their skin with grace. He thinks of the hundreds of sunsets they spent together in a hundred different worlds. And she’s here, she’s  _ here  _ and they’re safe and they never have to run from the Hunger for another day in their lives. 

“ _ And I’ll always be.”  _ She smiles at him and it is, undoubtedly, the most beautiful sight he’s ever seen. He kisses her, once, gently, and then they are quiet for a long time. They share a lazy smile as he trails his fingers through the gentle waves of her hair. 

_ “Can I tell you something?”  _ she asks, soft, shy. He nods.  _ “Every day I was stuck in that fucking umbrella I thought of you.”  _ She giggles like a lullaby.  _ “I think I fell in love with you again while I was gone.”  _

_ “I’d do anything for you.”  _ And he would. He did. 

She kisses him, long and grinning again.  _ “You already gave me your eternal soul, babe. What else are you gonna do?”  _

Anything. Anything. Anything. 

She’s the sun and he’s pulled into her orbit. She’s brilliant, she’s shining, she’s warm to the touch. She’s love. She’s returned to him, after the static of a lifetime apart. She’s touching his nose with the tip of a slender finger. She’s home. She’s always, forever, phantasmal, resplendent, picture-perfect. She’s painted indigo by twilight and he loves her, he loves her, he loves her. 

He can’t let her go. He touches her gently. He lets her hair slip gracefully between his fingers. And he holds her, her hands, her face, her body, and up on the hillside, again, again, he keeps not letting go. 

“ _ Oh, Lup,”  _ he sighs with another kiss. He cannot remember anything but her name. That much is familiar to him. 

Everything else feels brand new. They’re young again, old again, undead and undying and forever again. He loves her. He knows nothing else, and he’ll never have to. 

 


End file.
